by @PerfectaGala
March 2025

The music video for the dark folk band Chyorny Garazh follows Sister’s haunting journey through the menace and allure of the underworld, weaving eerie imagery and cryptic storytelling to perfectly match the song’s unsettling vibe. A dark-haired woman beckons as a mysterious creature looms outside the window at night, to the soundtrack of a faint crackling. The camera zooms in on her face. A jarring guitar jangle disrupts the silence, as the opening credits appear. The title emerges, followed by the ominous flapping of black crows, and mist creeps through the curtains, filling the room with an otherworldly presence. As the camera pulls away from the house, white curtains flutter, revealing a dark landscape beneath a giant moon—suggesting something unnatural is near. All this unfolds in the first 26 seconds of this 4 min music video, created entirely with AI by artist Veronika Pell (@mindeye_).

From the first note, the rhythm of Sister, with its minimal percussion and grounding patterns, sets a haunting, atmospheric mood, allowing the acoustic instruments to carry a raw, melancholic energy. The rhythmic “Bom Bom Bom” chorus pulses like a heartbeat, driving the narrative forward as monstrous creatures, seemingly grown from the earth, sing along. The video uses the language of film with matched cuts, particularly in a running scene where the music slows, and the video’s speed is shortened and blurred for dramatic effect. A sequence of white-robed figures dancing in sync with the music enhances the rhythm.

The dark, moody red, black, and white palette amplifies the unsettling atmosphere, ensnaring the viewer. Sister journeys through a surreal landscape by car and on foot, befriending a white wolf before floating into a sky filled with red swirling stars. The AI camera takes us through a red window into a mysterious cabin, where the band morphs into strange, otherworldly creatures, their silver guitars, long fingernails, and multiple drumsticks swirling in time with the music. The video and music are perfectly in sync, creating a rhythmic flow that immerses the viewer in the haunting world. Our heroine transforms into a werewolf, a horned creature, a bat, a giant fly, and more. The video concludes with a slow, panning shot over the landscape, where a car is seen parked in the distance.

This ground-breaking AI artwork was created using Midjourney for visuals and fully animated in Runway. The video, although entirely a work of imagination and collaboration with generative AI evokes the surreal styles of filmmakers like Andrei Tarkovsky, with slow pacing and otherworldly visuals, and Alejandro Jodorowsky, known for his bizarre, symbolic imagery, appears to influence the video’s surreal, immersive experience.

The internet is filled with AI-generated videos as these tools become more accessible. What Sister proves is that creating sophisticated results requires a collaborative partnership between the artist, the musicians, and generative AI tools. Veronika demonstrates that when used creatively, these tools can produce remarkable work.

Chyorny Garazh:
Kirill Markushin – vocals, programming
Kirill Anisimov – acoustic guitar, backing vocals
Aleksey Tolkachev – harmonica, backing vocals
Yuriy Vikhrev – bass guitar

With participation:
Vlas of Beats – drums, programming
Sergey Kuzmin – electric guitar
Evgeniy Belov – sound engineer
Korney Kretov – mixing, mastering

Mindeye – Visuals, animation, editing
Visuals created in Midjourney, animated fully in @runwayapp